By Daily Mail (U.S.) | Created at 2025-03-24 11:36:44 | Updated at 2025-03-26 08:15:03
1 day ago
Lying five miles beneath the surface of Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming is a timebomb more than 640,000 years in the making.
The Yellowstone supervolcano is a vast reservoir of magma with the potential to unleash a category eight eruption over 100 times more powerful than Krakatoa.
Thankfully, Yellowstone has never erupted within recorded human history.
But a new discovery has highlighted just how active this seemingly dormant volcano really is.
Scientists from the United States Geological Survey (USGS) have discovered a newly opened volcanic vent in Norris Geyser Basin.
The vent is at the foot of a rhyloite lava flow, and is spewing hot steam up into the air.
'While driving south from Mammoth Hot Springs towards Norris Geyser Basin early on August 5 last summer, a park scientist noticed a billowing steam column through the trees and across a marshy expanse,' the USGS explained.
'The eagle-eyed scientist notified the park geology team to verify if this was indeed new activity.'
Scientists from the United States Geological Survey (USGS) have discovered a newly opened volcanic vent in Norris Geyser Basin
The Yellowstone supervolcano is a vast reservoir of magma with the potential to unleash a category eight eruption over 100 times more powerful than Krakatoa
The new vent was discovered last summer within a region called the Roadside Springs thermal area.
Lying within a swath of warm, hydrothermally altered gound, approximately 200ft (60 metres) long, the new feature is about 9.8ft (three metres) below the marsh surface.
Shortly after it was identified, park geologists visited the vent to get a closer look.
There, they discoved a very thin veneer of grey silicious clay barely covering the ground, and temperatures of 77°C (171°F).
According to the team, this indicates the new vent is 'very young' in nature.
This isn't the first time that this type of hydrothermal activity has been spotted in the area.
Back in 2003, a similar vent was spotted just on the other side of the same rhyolite lava flow.
'Are the new feature and the activity that started in 2003 hydrologically connected?' USGS asked.
Shortly after it was identified, park geologists visit the vent to get a closer look. There, they discoved a very thin veneer of grey silicious clay barely covering the ground, and temperatures of 77°C (171°F)
This isn't the first time that this type of hydrothermal activity has been spotted in the area. Back in 2003, a similar vent was spotted just on the other side of the same rhyolite lava flow
'Probably.
'One could run a line along the axis of the older active area and it would intersect the new feature.
'This line also follows the trend of faults that run from Norris Geyser Basin northward to Mammoth Hot Springs and beyond.'
The new vent continued to spew steam into the air through into the autumn, but gradually disappeared in the winter.
'The feature remains active, but there is some water in the vent, decreasing the amount of steam that is released,' the experts added.
'Whether or not the strong plume returns in the summer of 2025 remains to be seen.'
So far, geologists have mapped more than 100 major hydrothermal areas in Yellowstone National Park, as well as more than 10,000 within its boundaries.
'The activity from these features waxes and wanes with time—you might even say that some of them pick up steam!' the experts joked.
The new vent was discovered last summer within a region called the Roadside Springs thermal area
Thankfully, USGS reassures that there is still about 100,000 years to go before the supervolcano is likely to erupt.
'In terms of large explosions, Yellowstone has experienced three at 2.08, 1.3, and 0.631 million years ago,' it explained.
'This comes out to an average of about 725,000 years between eruptions.
'That being the case, there is still about 100,000 years to go, but this is based on the average of just two time intervals between the eruptions, which is meaningless.'
COULD AN ERUPTION AT THE YELLOWSTONE SUPERVOLCANO BE PREVENTED?
Recent research found a small magma chamber, known as the upper-crustal magma reservoir, beneath the surface
Nasa believes drilling up to six miles (10km) down into the supervolcano beneath Yellowstone National Park to pump in water at high pressure could cool it.
Despite the fact that the mission would cost $3.46 billion (£2.63 billion), Nasa considers it 'the most viable solution.'
Using the heat as a resource also poses an opportunity to pay for plan - it could be used to create a geothermal plant, which generates electric power at extremely competitive prices of around $0.10 (£0.08) per kWh.
But this method of subduing a supervolcano has the potential to backfire and trigger the supervolcanic eruption Nasa is trying to prevent.
'Drilling into the top of the magma chamber 'would be very risky;' however, carefully drilling from the lower sides could work.
This USGS graphic shows how a 'super eruption' of the molten lava under Yellowstone National Park would spread ash across the United States
Even besides the potential devastating risks, the plan to cool Yellowstone with drilling is not simple.
Doing so would be an excruciatingly slow process that one happen at the rate of one metre a year, meaning it would take tens of thousands of years to cool it completely.
And still, there wouldn't be a guarantee it would be successful for at least hundreds or possibly thousands of years.
